(Xports News Reporter Yoon Jun-seok) Indian badminton women’s singles legend Saina Nehwal has officially confirmed her retirement.
The 2012 London Olympics women’s singles bronze medalist has been off the court for the past two years due to chronic knee problems, and her last official match was at the 2023 Singapore Open.
According to the Indian media ‘Indian Express’, Nehwal appeared on a podcast and directly announced that he had retired from badminton.
Nehwal said he would leave the badminton court without any separate press conference or official announcement of his retirement.
He said on the podcast, “I stopped playing two years ago. I came into this sport by choice, and I felt like I left by choice, so I didn’t think there was a need to announce it. If I can’t play anymore, that’s it. That’s okay.”
The direct reason for his decision to retire was the worsening condition of his knees. “My cartilage was completely worn away and I had severe arthritis. I only told my parents and coaches about this because they needed to know,” Nehwal said. “Now I probably won’t be able to do it anymore.”
He believes that his absence itself already explains the situation enough, adding, “With time, people will realize that Saina is no longer playing.”
The reality of not being able to handle the intensity of training was also cited as a factor that made retirement inevitable.
Nehwal explained that becoming a world-class athlete requires eight to nine hours of intense training a day, but his knees could no longer handle it.
He said, “I couldn’t push like I used to. Even after training for an hour or two, my knee swelled, and after that, it was very difficult to continue. So I felt like enough was enough. I couldn’t push anymore.”
Nehwal is considered the first ‘badminton superstar’ produced by India in the 21st century.
He stood out from a young age and proved his potential by winning a gold medal at the 2008 World Junior Championships.
Afterwards, she won a bronze medal in women’s singles at the 2012 London Olympics, setting the milestone of becoming the first Olympic medalist in Indian badminton history.
At the World Championships, she won a silver medal in 2015 and a bronze medal in 2017, and also won a bronze medal in the women’s singles at the 2018 Jakarta-Palembang Asian Games.
However, after 2016, injuries continued to hinder his career. Despite constant knee pain, he made a successful comeback by winning a bronze medal at the 2017 World Championships and a gold medal at the 2018 Commonwealth Games, but the recurring knee problem was never overcome.
In 2024, he disclosed that he suffered from knee arthritis and cartilage loss, and said that training for top competition was extremely difficult.
Nehwal recorded 1 win and 1 loss against Ahn Se-young, who is currently in the top tier of badminton women’s singles. In particular, in the quarterfinals of the 2019 French Open, he lost 0-2 to 17-year-old rookie Ahn Se-young, giving up both games in deuces. After defeating Nehwal in the competition, Ahn Se-young won a surprise victory by defeating 2018 Asian Games gold medalist Akane Yamaguchi (Japan) and 2016 Rio Olympics gold medalist Carolina Marin (Spain).
One of the victims of Ahn Se-young’s storm was Nehwal.
Meanwhile, Nehwal’s retirement announcement is evaluated as being in line with the generational structure of Indian badminton as a whole.
Currently, in Indian badminton, unlike the men’s singles division, which has a large player base, the women’s singles division is virtually empty.
Pusala Sindhu, the silver medalist at the Rio Olympics, is still considered a star player in terms of name value, but in reality, she is a veteran past her prime. The frequency of advancing to the top rounds of the recent BWF World Tour has also decreased significantly compared to the past.
There are currently no clear Indian women’s singles players who are consistently ranked in the top 20 based on world rankings, so there are many analyzes in the local and international badminton world that view the Indian women’s singles as a de facto ‘depression period’.
Photo = Yonhap News
Reporter Junseok Yoon jupremebd@xportsnews.com
